TV preview
“Ring of Fire,” 9 p.m. Monday
Although Johnny Cash is now considered an iconic dark, rebel country star who transcends generations, his wife June Carter Cash was better known when they first met in the early 1960s. She was part of the Carter family, nicknamed the “first family of country music,” then became a successful solo artist.
And most notably, she wrote one of Johnny’s biggest hits, “Ring of Fire.”
In the upcoming made-for-TV biopic shot in Atlanta dubbed “Ring of Fire,” Cash is played by singer Jewel Kilcher, best known for her 1990s singer-songwriter hits such as “Foolish Games” and “You Were Meant for Me.” The film, which covers six decades in a mere 89 minutes, debuts Monday. And it took just 18 days to shoot.
“One day,” said director Allison Anders, “we switched decades four times. Change sets, change hair, change clothes.”
Much of the film is spent with June struggling to control Johnny’s addiction to pills and alcohol. While the 2005 film “Walk the Line,” starring Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon, chronicled Cash’s story front and center, this movie “focuses on her private struggles,” Jewel said in a recent phone interview. “She was tremendously co-dependent. She enabled him. When she went into counseling, she was outraged. ‘I’m not the addict!’ “
The film spends ample time with June Carter Cash’s music, interspersed with snippets of her life.
As a result, Jewel wore numerous era-friendly wigs. But given the limitations of the budget, producers didn’t age her much. She readily admitted that in her final scene, when she plays a 72-year-old Cash, she still looks pretty young. “I wasn’t able to use prosthetics,” she said. “They would stretch your skin, put some glue on it and let it snap back. Instant wrinkles!”
For Jewel, the singing was the easy part. Acting was the challenge, given her relative lack of experience in that arena. She’s playing opposite Matt Ross as Johnny Cash. (Ross is perhaps best known as Alby on HBO’s “Big Love.”)
“I wouldn’t say I’m an actor,” she said. “I had to do my homework. I had to transform how I walk. I had to change my posture and laugh like her and sing like her. I had to work on the accent.”
Anders said the weight was on Jewel, and she pulled it off: “She was committed. She was prepared. She was willing to do whatever it took to bring the character to life.”
The biggest challenge of the film, Anders noted, was how magnetic a character Johnny Cash was: “June Carter was married to such an iconic personality and talent. You have to constantly steer the point of view back to June.”
The downtown music venue the Tabernacle masqueraded as several different venues, most notably Nashville’s classic Grand Ole Opry. “It’s identical to the Opry,” Anders said. “We couldn’t have asked for better.”
Cash was not just a singer; she had a knack for writing comedic material as well as songwriting.
“Despite a lot of heart-wrenching times in her life,” Jewel said, “she maintained a tremendous wit and humor. Life makes you bitter or you laugh harder. She chose to laugh harder.”
